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Pointing Dog Steadiness

Purpose: To prepare your dog for hunting, AKC hunt tests, and the steadiness component of the NAVHDA Utility test. You will know how to train your dog to be steady to the flush, wing, shot and the fall by the end of this course.

Prerequisites: Obedience training entailing heeling, whoa and come (here), dog must have been properly introduced to gunfire and the e-collar.

Course Cost (Register above):
For Credit: Live and OnDemand=$236.25
Audited: Live and OnDemand=$157.50

Live—You will speak to the instructor in an online “classroom” with other students. Choose from the listed times in the Course Registration box above.
OnDemand/Recorded—Watch classes "OnDemand"- at your own pace. Click on "OnDemand/Recorded Session" under "Register for Recorded Class" above.

Certification/For Credit-You will participate fully in the class with required homework and tests. You will send in homework (may include video) to learn "hands on" with the instructor examining and providing individualized feedback, attention and assistance on course material.
Audited-You will participate fully in the class with no required homework or tests.
The instructor will not provide any assistance out of class such as viewing your videos in order to be able to give you individualized feedback.

What you can expect to learn from this Course:

  • Understanding the need for steadiness both in the hunting and testing environment
  • Safety reasons for steadiness
  • How this course can help enhance other areas of the NAVDHA Utility test
  • Whoa board
  • Whoa on the ground
  • E-collar introduction and use
  • Whistle introduction and use
  • How to train steadiness to the flush, wing, shot and fall

Course Info: The Pointing Dog Steadiness course focuses on training techniques and theories for starting your dog on steadiness, the equipment to use, the types of training environments to use and step-by-step instruction to get your dog ready for hunting, AKC hunt tests and the NAVHDA Utility test.

Instructor, Lynn Erickson, has been involved with the care and training of animals all of her life. Lynn grew up on a farm in central Minnesota, hunting ruffed grouse without the benefit of a hunting dog. She has been involved with hunting dogs, their training, testing and breeding for the past 21 years. She owns and operates Herbst Briese Kennels, a full service kennel, offering training, boarding and grooming. She is a certified tattoo artist with the National Dog Registry.

I fell in love with pointing dogs long before I became a NAVHDA member or a NAVHDA judge. I have hunted behind and trained all sorts of dogs, but fell in love with my German Shorthairs. I personally own ten. I have hunted upland game and waterfowl for the past 35 years, sometimes without a dog or with someone else’s dog. I came to realize that hunting with a dog was by far, more enjoyable and productive. I have been involved in NAVHDA for the past 19 years and a NAVHDA judge for the past eleven years, just recently receiving a promotion to Senior Judge. Being a NAVHDA judge affords me the opportunity to walk behind a lot of different dogs, and allows me to see, first hand, many dogs. I have successfully trained my own dogs in the NAVHDA testing program through all levels of testing, including placing the title of Versatile Champion on my own Angel. During the past three years, I started testing my dogs in the AKC Hunt Tests.

Every fall will find me afield with my dogs, in Minnesota and North Dakota, in pursuit of ringneck pheasant, ruffed grouse, sharptails and ducks.

Student Information

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You must also read and agree to the E-Training for Dogs, Inc. Standard Terms and Conditions prior to taking a course: Click here to read these. You will be asked when you register if you have read them and will not be allowed to take the course if you do not agree to the terms.

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